January 21, 2024

1 Samuel 3:1-10 Broadway Christian Church
David A. Shirey

We begin a three-week series this morning titled “Something Old, Something New.” Old as in Old Testament.  The Hebrew Scriptures.  New as in new insights for a new day.

We begin with a story of an old man who can’t see and a teenager who can’t hear. There’s much to be gleaned from this story if, to borrow Jesus’ words, we “have eyes to see and ears to hear.” And we will if, like old Eli and young Samuel, we help each other across the generations to see and hear and turn for help to the Living God who is still speaking to old and young alike. 

More on that in a moment, but first things first, a little Bible story background.  This story of Samuel is part of the curriculum of Pathways, our Sunday school for our children. I checked with Sarah Merz, our Children’s Ministry Coordinator, and she said, “Oh yes, we do Samuel.” Sarah knows what we all know: telling and listening to the old, old stories from the Bible is critical to faith formation. Hearing them tells us how our story is woven into “the greatest story ever told.” So it is we teach them to our youngest disciples. That means bring your child to Broadway regularly and they’ll hear all the old, old stories.  Keep ‘em coming through adolescence and they’ll begin to learn how to interpret them for the living of their lives. Keep on coming throughout adulthood and the old stories just may change your life and through your changed life, others’ lives will be changed and the world will be better for it. In other words, it’s a good to dig into these “wonderful words of life,” including the story of a woman named Hannah who yearned to have a child, prayed fervently, and gave birth to a boy named Samuel which means “God hears [my prayer]”. In thanksgiving, she dedicated the child to God and sent him to Shiloh to be raised by the priest Eli. Sort of like sending your child away to religious boarding school. Which is where our story begins.

“Now the boy Samuel was ministering to the Lord under Eli. At that time Eli, whose eyesight had begun to grow dim so that he could not see, was lying down in his room” (1 Sam 3:1, 2). Hear that?  Old Eli can’t see. Now mind you, this diagnosis of Eli’s impaired vision isn’t made by an optician, but a theologian. We’re being told this aging priest’s not seeing isn’t a matter of the eyes of his head but the eyes of his heart. The Scripture says, “The word of the Lord was rare in those days; visions were not widespread” (1 Samuel 3:1). The priest had no vision. He could no longer see what God was doing. And when people in leadership roles, whether for their Temple, church, workplace, community, or nation no longer have a vision that directs and inspires, providing “strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow,”[1] that’s a problem. Pity people whose leaders have no vision. Such was the nation of Israel and the Temple in Shiloh as our story begins: their priest’s eyesight had grown dim. Eli had no vision. Not good. 

How about you? On a personal level, do you have a vision for your future?     Age isn’t the determinative factor in whether someone has vision or not. I know people up in years who wake up each new day expecting that God is “going to do a new thing, now it springs forth” (Isa 43:19), and they’re on tiptoes looking forward to it with 20/20 vision. And I’ve known younger people who, rather than being forward-looking, live only for today – live off the junk food of buying stuff and entertainment. Some people up in years have eyes lifted up to the future and some don’t.  Likewise, some younger and middle-aged people have vision and some don’t. It’s been said a car has a rear-view mirror one size and a windshield another size to remind the person in the driver’s seat to look ahead more than behind. Are you a person of vision?   

Eli wasn’t. His eyesight had grown dim. But, and I quote: “The lamp of God had not yet gone out” (1 Samuel 3:3). What a great line.  What a great reminder.  What a great promise.  There is still plenty of light to see by!  The lamp of God – the oil lamp that burned perpetually in the temple near the altar – had not gone out. Eli couldn’t see the future, but God’s light was still lighting the way ahead. Which reminds me of the tagline the United Church of Christ forged years ago that I cribbed for my sermon title: "God is still speaking." The bush is still burning.  God is still going before us “as a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night” (Ex 13:21). Lest we view the Bible as a dusty old book that tells stories that took place “once upon a time,” we need to be reminded that through these pages God is still speaking. 

Which raises a question: If God is still speaking, are we listening? Let’s be honest – it’s hard to listen. And it’s very hard to listen when the One speaking doesn’t do it through ear buds, headphones, cell phones, 55” plasma televisions with surround sound or even sanctuary sound systems deftly operated by such as Maggie Meade and Tom Brintnall. How does God speak? Thomas Keating, the wise contemplative Rick Frost’s Sunday school class has studied, said, “God’s first language is silence.  Everything else is a poor translation.” When it comes to hearing God’s Word amid all our noise and busyness, we’re all hard of hearing.

But if we’re honest, we’ll admit there’s part of us that doesn’t want to listen to God. It's true! You see, God’s Word seeks to stretch us by inviting us to consider things we previously haven’t or wouldn’t consider and we’d rather not hear anything that doesn’t prop up what we already believe. It’s called selective listening – hearing only what we want to hear. When our kids were growing up, I could say, "Wanna go to Dairy Queen?" and they'd hear me three blocks away.  But if I said, "Clean up your room" from three feet away they couldn’t hear me. What’d you say, Dad? Your lips are moving, but all I hear is “Blah, blah, blah.” The same affliction plagues us regarding God's Word. We're all ears to the stuff we like. But when it comes to the hard sayings of the Bible – those that require sacrifice, change, repentance, confession, love of enemies, tithing 10% of our income to God’s purposes – we’re hard of hearing. I’ve reached the point that one of my rules of thumb in discerning whether it’s God speaking or not is to ask myself, “David, is this something that if you did it would stretch you and likely change you, your mindset, your perspective, your life? If so, it might be God. You’d better listen.”

In our story, Samuel couldn’t hear. But his hardness of hearing had nothing to do with his auditory canal or eardrum.  Neither was it because of noise, busyness, or selective listening. Samuel couldn’t hear God’s voice clearly because his faith was still maturing. God called out “Samuel!” three times. But though Samuel heard the voice, he mistook the source – he thought it was Eli. He could hear, but not well enough to discern God’s voice. If he had, he might have sung the lyrics of the hymn we’re going to sing that goes, “Here I am, Lord… I have heard you calling in the night.”[2] But he didn’t because he didn’t hear clearly and he didn’t hear clearly because his ears weren’t yet attuned to God’s frequency.

Israel’s in a bad way! Eli can’t see and Samuel can’t hear.   

So what does God do? God gets through to Eli and Samuel through each other.  Eli is still attuned enough to God after a lifetime spent listening to God that he teaches Samuel how to recognize God’s voice. “Eli perceived that the Lord was calling the boy. Then Eli said to Samuel, “Go, lie down, and if he calls you, say, ‘Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening’” (1 Samuel 3:9). 

I read that and I said, “Good for you, Eli! Though you may no longer have a clear vision for the future, you’re willing to believe that a younger generation might. What’s more, you’re willing to help mentor young Samuel in how to listen for God’s voice. It’s clear to me looking out over you that many of you are Elis and Ellies, men and women who have walked the path of faith for a lifetime. Let me ask you a question: do you have a Samuel or a Samantha – a younger person you are currently encouraging, mentoring, praying for, helping them to recognize God’s voice?

The flip side of the coin is this:  Those of you who are younger – you Samuels and Samanthas. There’s a wealth of wisdom to be had by learning from an Eli or an Ellie.  Do you have certain older people to whom you turn to learn from and listen to? Hey, I’m soon to be 65 and I have mentors in their 80s and 90s I regularly lean on and learn from.

You’re never too old to have a mentor.  So I ask: Broadway Elis and Ellies, do you have Samuels and Samanthas you are mentoring?  Broadway Samanthas and Samuels, do have Ellies and Elis you look up to and learn from?     

You see, in God’s economy, nothing and no one is wasted.  Eli needs Samuel for his vision to be renewed. Samuel needs Eli in order to learn how to listen for God’s voice. It’s a beautiful thing when Eli and Samuel meet. When it happened in Israel long ago, it proved to be the dawning of a golden age.  And if Samuel and Eli, Samantha and Ellie, were to meet at Broadway today, who knows what new visions might break forth?  

There’s so much to be gained by Samuel-Eli encounters.  Speaking personally, this old Eli has been blessed in my months with you by younger Samanthas and Samuels by the names of Chloe and Abe and Michael and Kathryn and Maggie and that’s just scratching the surface of the younger generations of Broadway through whom God has gotten through to this old Eli.      

Here’s to the hope that all you Elis and Ellies whose vision is waning but who have an ear for the sound of God’s voice will connect with the Samuels and Samanthas of Shiloh Broadway who are just learning to listen for God, but have a huge windshield to look through into the 21st century.

The lamp of God hasn’t gone out.  God is still speaking.

Speak Lord, your servants old and young are listening.

Let all God’s people say AMEN.

[1] From the hymn “Great Is Thy Faithfulness”

[2] “Here I Am, Lord”  Dan Schutte